There are too many small organisms in this country that are trying to eat me

Reason # 22 why living with a microbiologist is the best. When you find a flea on the cat, you take it, dunk it in bourbon (for the dye of course) then throw it underneath a microscope. Because of course there is a microscope in next to the dinning room table. Why wouldn’t their be.

            Today is my Sunday the 26^th. Dad I hope you had a great birthday in I think Paris, but maybe it was Rome. Either way I was not able to contact you due to time zones, technological limitations and well my work schedule. For however long dad was in Europe there was a member of my immediate family staggered in roughly 8-hour times zones. We were the family version of a globlized company. Well done family. 

            Early in the week the winery asked us (day shift interns) if we would be interested in being the “wine drinkers” in a photo shoot the cellar door was doing for promotional reasons. They promised us a cheese platter and a bottle of wine for our efforts. Of course we did it. We got what we were promised and the only comment we made to the photographer was that we hope he can edit out the bags under our eyes. 

            St. Halletts, like most wineries in the barossa valley got its start making fortified wines. They still have barreled fortified in the cellar, so one day after work we were lucky enough to taste 5 different fortified from 5 different vintages all being different varietals. Now I don’t know much about fortified per say, so this turned out to be a very good learning experience. You really could follow the age progression from 80 (the oldest) to the 92’ (youngest) as well as tell the difference in varietals. That availability of tasting isn’t that uncommon in the Barossa, but for someone coming from the states, where we don’t have as much history around fortified, it’s a pretty big deal to taste through.

            Friday afternoon was I was lucky enough to have a very unique experience.  You don’t know these people, but Matt, Jackie and I went for a beer after we were all done with work. Matt and Jackie are two of the three other interns I worked with in Oregon, and now were all working within 10 kms of each other in Australia. That’s pretty cool to be able to do something like that. The only real differences were that the beer was coopers not ninkasi, and Rachel (the 4^th intern) wasn’t present.  Sorry Rachel.

            We have pretty much officially gone to two ten hour or so shifts, mine being from 5am-3pm 6 days a week. I get Sundays off. Financially Saturdays would be the better day off, but hey, I’ll live. 60 hours a week at the rate I’m being paid is still good money. That being said it takes it out on you working a physically demanding job with those hours.  I wouldn’t trade it for anything though, especially a 9-5 commuting job. No thank you.

Saturday felt like the real first day of the type of vintage I expect. 5am you hit the ground running, samples, pump overs, pressing, rackings, more samples, more pump overs, transferring juice, inoculating tanks, tasting the BM45 tank(yeast strain), eating my sandwich which cleaning a tank, boss hands you a beer, oh shit its 3pm, finish the last job only to have the last tank overflow on you covering you in Riesling juice (twice the sugar content of coke, hence why my cloths might start fermenting). No time for lunch, literally running between jobs, two people to do what there is usually 5 to do, best day of vintage so far.  And that is after a night out at the two hands intern house hanging out having some wine. (I’ll elaborate on what all of those winery jobs are later on in this blog)  That is more of a description of what an interns life is during harvest, but not complete. Maybe over all of these blogs you/I will be able to get a better grasp on how to describe the lifestyle. 

Saturday night I went with Matt to a 50^th birthday party for a local winemaker. The party was held at a house on the Lengmeil winery property. Now I’m sure I’ve mentioned lengmeil in at least one of my other blog posts about wine to look for if you get a chance. No sense in telling you why again, I’m just reiterating it. The winemaker whose birthday it was now helps with the production of soul growers. That’s literally all I can tell you because that’s all I know. Matt has the hookup though we will check it sometime very soon. The man known as Westie was previously the winemaker at a place right up the road from St. Halletts called Rockford. Now Rockford (I cant imagine you can get it in hitimes, but its worth a look) is a winery that utilizes only oldschool technologies. They make some really unique wines in the area due to their difference in handling the fruit.  All of the wine that was present was from that winery from 97’ – 02’. The highlight bottle of the night was a 1997 basket pressings Shiraz from a 6L bottle. Did I mention that a local microbrewer brewed a batch up just for the party. Apparently there were cases upon cases and a lot of guests went home with bottles, somehow I missed out.It would have been a nice consolation prize as my phone was a casualty of an overflowing pool due to a sort of contest of the belly flopping causing many a surge.  Its not so much the phone but the battery in that it struggled for 3 days before completely loosing its charge and not holding a new one. #shithappens, #reasonsIdon’townaniphone.  The wine industry is probably in the top 5 for industries that know how to party.  Were not talking wine bars and posh tastings, were talking the best wine, which directly correlates with some of the best food (wino’s know how to cook), at some of the most beautiful estates.  Plus a lot of like minded friendly individuals; you have the makings of a memorable party.  Before you formulate your counter argument, just remember who makes all those bottles of Cristal you aspire to one day drink sitting in a club table.

just a few fortifieds to taste after work, nbd

sorry jacki, but i had to post matts face telling this story

Sunday was my day off, woohoo day’s off.  Sunday started at something called a breakfast rave. I’ll allow you a moment to think about what that could actually mean. The most perfect way to describe the breakfast rave is that if Zane lamprey were ever to shoot an episode of Three Sheets and get Three Sheets with a bunch of winemakers, this is where his morning after hangover cure would take place. I think my level of inebriation the night before was more due to delirium from 5 am starts as apposed to the alcohol consumed. Locally grown food, coffee and tea from local producers, pleasant scenery, a pretty girl singing pretty songs with pretty guitar music being played. Other than maybe a Sunday morning surf with just my friends out I cant think of a better way to enjoy a Sunday morning. It’s all non-profit and at the end you can take some of the food home that doesn’t get consumed.  Its once a month with an ever changing location. When you live in a small farming/wine centered valley, these kind of social occasions bring every out. Its something that wannabe hippies would think is overly cool and trendy until all the families and kids and travelers like myself show up. Here its just a pleasant way to spend a Sunday morning.  Of course we went wine tasting in the afternoon. I have a recommendation for any of you who are really interested in getting the feel for a wine area, seek out the place that is pouring wine from a lot of small producers. It might be called a winemaker studio, might have a name that represents the place, Like A “A taste of Eden” like the one I went to. The valley next to us is the eden valley known for its Riesling, and by far the prettiest place I have seen yet in Australia.  All the wines that were poured were from different years/different winemakers/and different areas. You may not taste the “best” wine, but you are able to gain an understanding of a place quicker than just seeking out the wineries in the tour book. Look for Eden valley Rieslings if you’re looking for a white from aus.  

I know I keep saying that I’ll post about winery workings during vintage. I’ll get around to it soon enough with pictures to follow. Not a lot of time for the Internet with everything else that’s been going on. I know one of the main reasons I keep up with the blog posts is because it helps me keep track. Highlighted subjects of the next blog post may contain more on my living situation, finding a phone and related (miss) adventure, and winery happenings.

The only two more things I want to say are. Everybody should go get a clothesline, dryers are nice for the occasional thing but we live in southern California.  And you should all go listen to the song “all my friends” by LCD soundsystem. 

"I Can Sleep When I'm Dead"

It's a fifteen hour flight back to the states plus i'll be getting back an entire day. I'll sleep then. 

I’m making it a point to never say no to any social gathering or event or gathering.  Maximizing my experience here in Australia is very important. This also happened to be our last weekend off before the fruit and ferments really pick up in work, which is destined to be this week.  Work has been somewhat slow, hence the plethora of new pictures mostly from the winery.  There are enough interns to run 24 hours, which might happen starting the next week, but when we aren’t 24 hours there are a lot of interns just roaming around for not that much work. And since we finished most of the preharvest cellar cleaning (its never done though) it was slow.  That will change next week with red ferments starting to finish and nonstop processing. Essentially Friday afternoon the cellarmaster told us go enjoy the weekend because it will be your last off for a while. So what do we as the St. Halletts intern crew, we go to Adelaide for a night of Chinese food and inebriation.  Reason #422 why my industry is the best: the corkage at the Chinese restaurant is 5 dollars per person for an unlimited amount of wine. We showed up with 13 bottles for 12 people. Lots of aromatic whites to offset the Peking Duck.  All of the bottles got opened, the good ones were finished, and the ones that didn’t meet the cut were passed off to the tables around us.  Then we went out to some of the Adelaide Bars. A very nice way to spend the last free weekend for a while.

            That also means harvest is really starting. The harvest schedule for me means 5am-3pm Monday to Saturday for at least the next month, hopefully longer.  Its borderline the worst possible time frame imaginable. Waking up at 4 am every day is earlier than one would consider waking up early, but not early enough to constitute “night” and thus benefit from the increase in financial compensation. Do you have breakfast or a midnight snack? It awed going to bed when its light and getting up when its dark. But hey, I’d rather set up than clean up, that is for damn sure.  And for anyone who works production in the wine industry, it’s a lot of rewarding hard work and why you do it.  I mean come one. Were making wine people.

            I planned to post a lot more, and im “writing” more than is being posted, but a lot of it are thoughts about this and about that. Mostly with the comical sarcastic cynicism I aspire to in my life (damn you Edward Abbey). Not sure why I tell you that. Probably as an excuse as to why my blog is boring.  A few thoughts/proverbs/philosophies to adhear by which have effected me or the people currently in my life may suffice for your daily philosophical satisfaction.

 “An uninteresting person in an interesting setting is still an uninteresting person”-some of you have herd me say that in relation to many people in my/our generation in regards to the social experiences they seek out. Same holds true for people visiting Australia.

“Thinking positively about your place in life helps to create your own ideal destiny”- I wrote that down at work today, at about 6 am watching a crusher NOT work. The epiphany sorta came to me when I relised that even though im on the lesser of the two shifts, based on compensation rate and start time, Im still making more money than I would be at home and I’m in friekin Australia. Checks off my hypothetical bucketlist have and will continue to be marked.

you know, just hanging out in the press

“Think of every experience as a learning experience” This more holds true to working in the winery. I have limited wine knowledge and no real schooling in it, but I know how a cellar works. Regardless there are some practices at this winery that I may not agree with as far as winemaking or production. That is almost more of a learning experience than practicing what I think is perfect winemaking/winery working. This way when I do finally formulate my own methods at running a winery I’ll have the validity in other practices to believe and argue that mine is the “right” way.  That’s why being able to travel and work this vintages is one of the best experiences for a life and a career.  Sorry only one picture this time, but it was a hard one to get so appreciate it damnit. the picture may be crap, but the job im doing inside the press cleaning it is not crap. after a day of pressing you have to get inside and hose out all of the grape seeds and skins that are lodge inside. This one is not tall enough to stand up in nor is the floor flat at any point. The bag over my head is what pushes against all the grapes with up to 2 Bars of pressure. The camera was on a strange angle when i took the picture, understandable when there is not flat surface, so a corner was used.  This however is a sight you would never see even touring a winery. 

Main topic of my next post: “other winery practices during harvest”

stop buying yellowtail

A couple of comments from the bottom of the bottle. first off i've been working on a few other more contemplative blog entires that may or may not get posted, we will see. I thought my last blog post was more poorly written than the usually are and lacked in any real humor.   i'll do what i can to keep you entertained as well as elaborating beyond a facebook status on what i've been doing.

machine harvester 4:45 am

First, I am going to make an ASSumption that some of you actively choose to read this blog. for that im sorry. Maybe when your avoiding study, avoiding your dismal fantasy basketball team, or just avoiding, someone has to read it.  I, Joshua Alexander Smith of 8 kook street, tanunda, South Australia would like to hear back from all of you.   By email (joshuasmith21089@gmail.com), facebook, transpacific dolphin express, I dont really care, but it would be nice to hear back. some of you I talk to on a regular basis, most of you I do not. And shame on you, I consider myself decently interesting.   thoughts on adventure, opinions about aussie wines (everyone go drink them, but then dont go drink them because they have to travel all the way across the world and that is not very local, which brings me to an important point if any of you read my blog.  its great to have wines from all over the world at a place like hitimes, but for the love of dionysus stop buying yellowtail. Cheap-ass-wine all tastes essentially the same.  At least when you make the conscious decision to purchase that kind of refinery style wine (that is not an elegant wine term, its a reference to the oil refinery look of those facilities) buy something that was grown in the united states. buy two buck chuck, or any of the 50 or so wine brands owned by gallo. just because it comes from australia doesn't mean its any better.  If your avidly seeking hill of grace, or Grange those twelve people in the united states are forgiven, however if you are actively seeking those you could fly down here and buy one yourself. wine is a very global industry, but if your going to drink cheap, drink local). that was a long tangent, but your feedback, comments, stories would be appreciated.  the second thing I was going to briefly discuss is my schedule for work. None of you can complain about getting up in the morning unless your getting up at 3:59 am or before. Im currently starting my shift at 5 am that goes till 3pm. I do however love every minute of it, hence why you cant complain if its any later. it does however make for a very early bed time and a somewhat lethargic afternoon. But hey, thats what im here for and thats what I signed up for.  Its funny, I am about 18 hours ahead of california time, so if on a day when i have to get up at 4 you sleep in till 10 im essentially living 1 day ahead of you. The picture is of a machine harvester picking grapes at 445 in the morning out in front of the winery.  third observation is have any of you seen the aussie dollar. aussie dollar 1:1.10 US dollars. that means that if i send back 1000 aussie dollars i get 1100 US dollars. keeping an eye on that exchange rate as well as looking into transferring some of it back early.

“nobody likes you when you're 23”

Two hands, Henschke, St. Halletts represented

Somebody needs to tell me grandma that i got a cake

Too soon to be quoting Blink-182. Probably. Lets just hope it’s not true. If you know me, you know I’m not big on birthdays.  Mine being today, February 10^th, always fell either during the height of gymnastics season or midterms.  Its never been that important to me to celebrate turning a year older, granted I’ve had some fun birthdays. Those of you who were there for my 20^th know what I’m talking about.  I know I beat this line around the block, but had you asked me at 20, or even at 21 where I would be for my 23^rd birthday I don’t think Tanunda, or even Australia would have been on the short list. I probably would have said I hope to be still in Santa Cruz, or back home.  I for sure would not have said I think I’ll spend it working a 5am to 3 pm shift at a winery in Australia pressing Semillon and sauvignon blanc grapes to make wine.  However I guess if your not celebrating your passion somehow on your birthday your not really celebrating yourself. In 22 years 364 days 18 or so hours (my birth certificate says I was almost born on the 11^th) I’ve won a statewide athletic competition, graduated high school, held a steady job, traveled to 5 continents, 17 states, spent at least 3 months total in a tent, surfed countless waves, lived with a wonderful family, kept a great group of friends, graduated with a respectable college degree, and perused what I still believe is my passion. Those things have all been made possible by mostly my family and friends, thank you so much family and friends. 

            (that was on birthday, the rest is post, written on the 12^th)

            Again, if you know me, you know birthday’s are not that big of a deal, they still seem to work themselves out to be a great time. On my actually birthday I worked. Napped, then went and hung out with a great group of interns the next town up, drank some awesome old and new wines. Let me diverge for a bit and describe to you the wine intern.  First off, they all love wine, regardless of depth of knowledge about wine; they all passionately enjoy the art/culture/flavors/experience of wine.  Some people grow up wanting to be lawyers, some want to be doctors, others teaches or paleontologists, no intern grew up wanting to work in wine, they happened into it one way or another.  It’s always by any of three main paths. School provided us with the introduction and presented further opportunities, the job we were previously in sucks and we make that leap of faith and try something new, or you were born into the industry.  No intern is ever settling for a harvest job. Harvest is the best time of year for an intern. You work somewhere around 60 hours a week for 6-8 weeks, don’t sleep, go out with other sleep deprived interns, and eat and drink incredibly well.  The standard of living in regards to food and drink for an intern during harvest is somewhere high up in the upper-class, yet it costs a hell of a lot less (hello free wine). It’s a subtle fraternity of seasonal workers that essential enable the entire wine industry to succeed (they need our “skilled” labor). Oh, and they are one of the coolest groups of people I have ever met. If you think your world is small, try the wine intern circles (hung out with an aussie who has also spent time at lumpy’s landing) This brings me full circle in regards to my “birthday” party, which was really just an excuse to have a bbq.  But invite all wine interns, and you have a feast of food and drink fit for sunset magazine. Great wines, great bbq, a chocolate cake, international friends, What more can you really ask for on your birthday.  The few presents I got were awesome bottles of wine that really aren’t even presents just a convenient excuse to open nicer wines meant to be shared. And I had homemade Mexican food (really the only present needed) Basically I’m glad how it turned out. 22 treated me very well, 23 is already looking like it could top that.

            Work is essentially going the same, just getting in lots of white varietals.  Hopefully by the end of the week we will see the first reds but we really need a nice spike in the heat to kick everything into full ripening. It looks like were going to get that with a few days in the mid to low 30’s this next week. The last two harvests I’ve worked have been shit growing years. No need to sugar (Oregon wine industry pun) coat is. The sucked. I would really like to work during a stellar vintage that is known. So in 10 years time when you look back at 2012 barossa wines. I can say I worked that awesome vintage. Things are looking up at this point, but we still need a few atmospherically warm days.  I’m going to make it a goal to post something new every few days, and not just bundle it up in bulk here, but we will see. So enjoy for now, your responses and thoughts on any of this would be appreciated, but keep the literary corrections to a minimum. 

posted pictures

I dont know where all of you check this blog from, nor if you check this blog. but if for some reason you check it other than via my facebook, i posted a picture album of 49 pictures, this not being one of them, this is at Henscke's winery for our tour about 10 days ago. Henscke's is one of the older more renowned wineries in the valley. those things on the ground at our feet are really old underground tanks. saves space and its efficient temp regulation, but tripling hazard. enjoy the pictures. and if were not friends on facebook thats really to bad

sarcasm does not traverse accents well

First to comment on the title.  On any given day I interact with 7 different accents of the English language ranging from the Canadian to the different areas of Australia. One thing I’ve really noticed other than kiwi’s have to much slang is that sarcasm doesn’t translate well. It makes sense due to all the subtle differences in tone that we utilize for sarcasm. I think we are all getting better about it, but only because we are getting to know each other better, it has nothing to do with our individual accents. When a stranger opens their mouth to speak, I now expect it to be with an Australian accent; at first I was slightly surprised each time.

            I moved out of the hostel as previously eluded to in the previous posts. Now I have stayed in very few hostels, so I can’t comment on the quality of this one as compared to others, but to me it seemed very nice.  There were a few factors that just made it not the right fit, price being a big one.  The room I moved into is my own room some 5 blocks away for twenty dollars a week cheaper than sharing a room with 3 other people (granted they were fellow interns).  I don’t have to pay for washing or Internet here and I do not need to fight for refrigerator, storage, or personal space.  Second being work related. This next week I start at 5 am every day to get the first pressing done, that means realistically I need to go to bed no later than 9; I’d like to see you try and do that in a full hostel of unemployed backpackers. 90% of the backpackers there were Europeans (germans mostly) looking for grape picking jobs because if they do 3 months worth of agricultural work they get a 2^nd year on their work visa.  I got tired of answer questions about grape picking or telling people that my winery was not hiring.  When you work in the industry that drives the entire local economy, it does not take long to start feeling like a resident. Especially in our in of work, you meet a lot of locals who all share a similar passion you and happily bring you into the community. It was strange starting to feel like a resident of the area but living with a bunch of travelers, most of which could really care less about the local wine.  The house I moved into is owned by a woman in her 40’s, no kids or husband, who works as the head microbiologist for a larger wine conglomerate know as treasury. Talk about a cool job.  She does a lot of Lab setup, quality control and proper trials, but knows close to all there is known about the microbiology of wine. Scientific discussions have and will continue to ensue. And she is awesome. Also living in the house is a girl from Modesto who graduated from ucsb in the spring with a biochem degree. She is actually the one who sort of enabled me to be able to move in, so, thanks Alyssa.  We all pretty biochem/microbio interested in relation to wine, I’ll probably start taking notes. That and did I mention that the door into my room is from the kitchen, its okay if you want to be a little jealous, its still a nice surprise for me every time.  Did I mention that they both work in labs, and labs have to keep any bottle of wine that goes off for bottling for 3 months then it can be discarded, and what better way to discard a 60 dollar bottle of wine than to drink it.

Press dreams

the 12 ton BUCHER

Most of the juice will come through this tray

           I’m writing most of this in hindsight, but see no reason to delete and not post the previous essays of my literary genius.  This will be one of 4 posts today. One that was previously written, this one, and two others relating to the fine wine I have drunk and the other to my new living situation.  We were originally scheduled to get the first fruit on Thursday, but a string of certain atmospheric factors caused that fruit to arrive on Tuesday. It’s the second most exciting day of vintage next to the last day you receive fruit. Another satisfactory name would be hurry up and wait day. One of the “problems” with a lot of winery equipment is its only used for really 2 months out of the year. It sees a good six months worth or work, just in a 3^rd the time. That means that the problem that was ignored, forgotten, or delegated up or down is back.  And it’s pissed.  Hence why the first day of fruit receiving is hurry up and wait day.  

            It seems that for this vintage I am going to running the presses. One is a modern 12 ton Buchar (nice computer controlled user friendly press). The other is a 7 ton vintage press that looks like a Steinbeck character would reside in it in the off-season. For those of you not up to date on modern industrial wine making practices, here is a brief rundown of what running the press entails right now for white wine, I’ll explain red later when we do it.

1.     Fruit is delivered

2.     Fruit goes through the crusher/de-stemer. This handy piece of machinery separates berries from the stems and leaves

3.     Then the fruit is pumped down to me at the press (start of my job)

4.     I first drain off what’s called the free run: this is the better juice full of nice flavor tannins and soft phenolic compounds.

5.     This I then drain off into the catch tray and pump to a clean tank in waiting

6.     Once enough of the free run is drained out, I communicate with the winemakers about when to make what we call a press cut.  A cut is when we switch to another tank due to increasingly stronger phenolic compounds and harsher tannins. These become present the longer free run fruit sits or when we press.

7.     Once I am given the blessing to make the cut, I transfer the new juice to another tank to be fermented separately (the idea is to have as many blending options in the end as possible)

8.     From here I will select one of the predetermined press cycles which will squeeze the grapes in sequential increasing pressures until 2 Bar (two atmospheres or the pressure at 66ft under water) this essentially gets all the juice out of the grapes

9.     Empty press of the mark (essentially dry skins which are taken for either compost of to ferment then distill by someone else)

10.  Repeat and from step 3 until all the fruit is in.

While the press is running its not as important for me to be standing there, so in the meantime I’m doing any number of things.  Typically I’m making certain additions that will either protect the juice or maximize the flavor potential. I also have to sample all the tanks I’ve been pressing into and deliver those samples to the lab.  My favorite thing to do during vintage is inoculations and fermentation monitoring. However at this winery that’s not really an option for me due to how things are delegated out, that responsibility falls with the lab and another winery worker. So my next best choice would have been running the press. You get to work closely with the winemakers, you get to be a part of both the red and white wines, you get to see/taste each different lot of fruit that comes in, and your pretty well in the middle of the pre fermentation process. Also you need to be able to do other things in your downtime. It’s a pretty damn enjoyable job. 

If you think a puppy is a lady killer, try a baby kangaroo

           (this blog is a bit old for a post)

hill of grace vineyard with 100+ year old vines

try saying no to that face

one brave kiwi wearing his all blacks shirt on australia day

Australia day. Australia day is a national holiday akin to the 4^th of July, with essentially the same goals and end results. You must eat something off a bbq, and you must drink a lot of beer. Sound familiar.  What it lacked was a bike ride of the beach, but what it gained is whats called triple J’s top 100. Triple J is the Australian national government run alternative music station, according to me; it’s the best station I have ever listened to.  It’s the like best stuff from Kroq, 947, and the soundtrack to the art of flight al wrapped into one station. they play music ranging from the arctic monkeys to immortal technique to skrillix (so even bren could maybe listen to it.)  They also are required by law to play at least 25% Australian music. In the months leading up to Australia day you vote one for your top 10 songs which gets complied into the list that is played starting at noon on Australia day. Over 1 million people vote every year, and everyone listens to the countdown. In a lot of places like the beach or city parks everyone has it tuned into that station creating an accidental surround sound. I don’t have the list, but look it up. 

            I went to a bbq with a pool at one of my fellow interns houses. Drank lots of coopers sparkling, hung out in the shade all day and listened to the triple J countdown. It was a solid day.  In my brief observation there are two things aussies aren’t that big into; Hot sauces, and drinking games. Leave it to the two Americans to get a game of beer pong going within two hours of being there. And leave it to the two Americans to loose the first game of beer pong to a kiwi wearing an “All Blacks” shirt on Australia day (that takes some balls) and girl from Portugal/Denmark/United States. Not my finest moment. Evidently though, Beer Pong has taking its rightful place as Americas 4^th sport behind football, baseball, and basketball. (Sorry hockey, you’re still above baseball in my book, ‘cough’ I mean go angels Palmer) Lucky for me if I make it back to the states for the 4^th of july, I’ll have gotten to celebrate two such independence days in one year.

            Australia day + 1. I think it was a cruel joke by our fellow aussie interns to schedule us a tour and tasting at one of the best and most well respected wineries in the Australia, Henschke. That being said, aussie’s seem to have heavyweight caliber livers.  Henschke’s Im 99 percent sure you can get at Hi-times. And look for it. higher acid, finesse wines that come from Eden valley and Adelaide hills. Their vineyards are the most meticulously kept I have ever seen. The Hill of grace vineyard situated in front of the hill of grace church (pictured somewhere on this blog) is arguable the most iconic setting for old vine Shiraz in Australia. Bottom line people stateside, look for the wine. Lunch was at Maggie beers. No beer is served at Maggie beers as part of some cruel pun, but what they do serve at Maggie beers is some of the best chicken/duck/pheasant liver pate (accent on the e needed).   Nothing like some good animal fat.  Nap time ensued.

            I feel very fortunate to be in the place that I am. I feel more fortunate and or lucky, probably lucky, to have meet some of the people I have. Knowing locals is such a beneficial thing in wine country. With some many gimmicks and wine bars and start up wineries, its sometimes hard to know where to look. We are fortunate enough to be working with two locals our age very invested in the wine region (5^th generation grower) to know the right people and the ins and outs of the valley. We are really starting off on the right foot meeting the right people.

            Im currently looking for a new place to live. This hostel is very nice and I’ve met a lot of cool people (mostly Germans), but everyone here is looking for agricultural work. Most of them can get a second year on their work visa if they work 3 months in either agriculture, mining, or one other “undesirable” industry.  Most are here looking for picking jobs, and good on them, I hope they get hired. However I don’t think they will. The mentality and conversational topics hostel wide are about finding work. Hard to show sympathy when you look forward to going to work the next day.  The price isn’t as right as I originally thought. The “rent” is 10-20 dollars more a week then for a bedroom in town, and Internet and wash don’t come free.  I understand it’s for the traveler, however I am quickly moving into the resident phase. I’m sure I’ll find something and have two somewhat promising leads.

            Today we went out to the Claire valley, the next wine tasting valley up into the “outback” from the Barossa. Known for the Rieslings, we were very surprised at how great the Cab Sav’s have been. We made it to 8 wineries. Only one was sub par.  For once in my life my palate burnt out early. So much acid and lots of tannin structure covered your mouth when you drank the wines. After a hundred of such wines, I could barely tell the difference between white and red (not due to being drunk, I was spitting). The roads are very stereotypical of what you would expect. Dirt roads lined with gumtrees (eucalyptus) with amber plans as far as the eye can see. Sometimes I half think I’m back in California, but then you see a kangaroo warning sign (they do damage like deer). I’ve seen a few in the wild but a picture of one has eluded me. Aside from getting a picture of some of the para and lorakeets, I really want to see a drop bear (koala).